Brand Licensing: It’s Time to Go Beyond the Hologram

Holograms were once the gold standard for product verification. Now, three decades later, the newest technologies are enabling a much more secure and comprehensive solution to product authentication – also going well beyond QR codes and RFID. Yet, many brands have not evolved their approach to protecting their licensed products.

Recently at SPLiCE’s Licensor’s Summit and LIMA’s Licensing Expo events, we talked with brand licensing professionals and other executives about today’s product authentication possibilities and focused a good bit on questions about why holograms are outdated.

Attendees at several roundtable sessions were surprised to learn just how far the value of holograms has deteriorated. In fact, we’ve heard from companies that have found imitation products using holograms even though their original does not.

A recent test we conducted also showed that there are many vendors in online marketplaces claiming to produce custom and unique “security holograms.” In reality, these often are no more than look-alike, mass produced stickers with no real authentication value.

To help attendees at the events identify the ideal product authentication and compliance solution, we provided four key diagnostic questions:

Is the technology behind the authentication solution the most secure available today?

Does the technology support true and automated authentication without dedicated hardware, training and expert knowledge?

Does the solution report real and fake scans and provide channel insights?

Can the solution be integrated easily into an existing product ecosystem including labeling, IT platform, and audit, partner and logistics processes?

The most effective authentication solution will deliver an affirmative answer to all of these questions by offering both passive and active protection. A passive visual signal to consumers and everyone in the supply chain is an important deterrent. However, it also must be easy for all stakeholders to use while providing counterfeit attempt alerts in real time along with other marketplace data.

Click here for our full presentation on going beyond the hologram on Slideshare